Women Directed Movies in 2011

Women Directed Movies in 2011

Yesterday, the Hollywood Reporter roundtable on directors made me crazy, but it also made me think. While I will give them no leeway on the ridiculous comment asking the directors to name a major movie directed by a woman this past year, I thought it would be good to look at ALL the movies directed by women this year in order to get a decent assessment of where we are going on two years after Kathryn Bigelow won the best director award.

Looking back to last year both Winter’s Bone and The Kids Are All Right were a part of the year end discussion in a big way and both films nabbed Oscar nominations. But neither Debra Granik nor Lisa Cholodenko were nominated for best director.

This year I feel we are in the same boat and quite frankly the strong films directed by women that could be in the awards mix are not generating a lot of buzz.

That’s 4 women directed films in the top 200 grossing films of the year. (of course there are a few that haven’t still opened and one in particular Arthur Christmas seems poised to get into the top 100 if not top 50.) Aside from box office grosses there are only 23 women on this list, and if you look at the films there are only a handful that made it out of NY and LA. I am duly depressed.

Films directed by Women 2011 (please let me know if I missed any- these do not include any documentaries)

Kung Fu Panda 2 – Jennifer Yuh #12

Red Riding Hood- Catherine Hardwicke #63

One Day – Lone Scherfig #107

The Whistleblower- Larysa Kondracki #174

Country Strong – Shana Feste (did Oscar qualifying run in 2010)

Queen to Play – Caroline Bottaro

The Beaver- Jodie Foster

In a Better World- Susanne Bier (won the Oscar for best foreign language film)